In an email to a partner today, YouTube confirmed that the new look for the video page they have been testing recently is about to go live. Not long after that, the changes did indeed go live. In case you haven’t seen the new page, it makes the video more of the focus and ditches the clutter.

Right up at the top is the uploader’s information. In addition to the subscribe button, you can see a drop down with the uploader’s other videos. There’s a new player button that puts the video into widescreen mode. This moves the other page elements down. The five star rating system is now gone, replaced instead by a simple thumbs up or down system. Rating a video lets you see how others have rated it. The video description has moved to a drop down right below the video. The recommended video pane now also has an autoplay button so you can avoid all that pesky clicking.

Overall, we feel like it’s a pretty good redesign. It looks much cleaner than the old version, and the video seems like a more prominent part of the page. How do you feel about it?

The SlingPlayer app for the iPhone has long been a good example of what the platform can do. When last month Sling was allowed to stream video of AT&T’s 3G network, the deal got even better. Now we’re hearing that Sling is hard at work on a version of the app specifically for the iPad. This is great news for every Slingbox owner who whishes the iPhone screen was just a little bigger.

The current SlingPlayer app (which costs $29.99) will work on the iPad, but will be upscaled. Sling was tight lipped about just when the iPad native app would show, but did seem to hint that it would be able to stream video at the iPad’s native resolution of 1024 x 768. We’re skeptical that this sort of resolution will be possible over AT&T’s 3G network, even with high compression.

The only real concern we have is the cost. If the iPhone version is $30, how much will the iPad edition cost? Are there any Slingbox owners out there? Would a high quality Sling app for the iPad entice you to take the iPad plunge?

In a recent blog post, Jessie Becker from Neflix's marketing team said the online video rental and streaming service has mailed out discs to a number of Wii owners to enable streaming on their Nintendo-brand console.

"We are in the final phase of getting ready for the launch of streaming to the Wii," Becker writes. "Today, we shipped out instant streaming discs for the Wii to some of our Netflix members. Their feedback will ensure that we deliver a great experience to everyone when we launch."

The upcoming launch will complete Netflix's console triple play, though it's unclear exactly when the service will go live. Those who receive a disc will have access to the streaming service right away, but in an email to CNet, a Netflix representative said, "We have not announced a full launch; however, it will be soon."

Europe’s favorite streaming music service, Spotify, is finally on track for a US launch. The expected release should happen in the third quarter of 2010. The Stokholm-based company is in talks with unidentified internet and cell carrier partners about the details for the launch. Spotify’s senior VP said to day that they are already in the process of buying servers space in the US.

Spotify currently has 7 million customers in Europe, about 325,000 of which pay a monthly fee for additional features. In Europe, Spotify allows users to choose specific songs to stream. This is different from US services like Pandora which just stream songs from a particular genre. However, it is currently unclear what form Spotify will take in the US.

Mobile apps already exist for the iPhone, Android, and Symbian. These would presumably be available for US users. Would you be interested in Spotify? What features would you need to see before paying for a premium subscription?

I case you had forgotten, Viacom is still suing YouTube. Opening statements were presented today and the arguments are shaping up much as we expected. Viacom says YouTube doesn’t do enough to keep copyrighted materials off YouTube, and YouTube says that the “safe harbors” provision of the DMCA protects them from the claims. However, some interesting bits of behind the scene dealings have also come out.

According to a blog post by YouTube Chief Counsel Zahavah Levine, for years Viacom hired people to upload their content, and even went so far as to “rough up” the video so it looked stolen. In an attempt to be stealthy they sent employees to the local Kinkos to upload some content so it wouldn’t be traced to Viacom. All this sneaking around worked super well, even on Vacom itself. YouTube points out that Viacom occasionally asked for a clip to be removed only to reverse themselves upon realizing they uploaded it. According to YouTube, several of the clips involved in the suit were uploaded by Viacom.

The post closes with assurances that YouTube would fight the charges and continue to be a “leader in providing media companies with 21st century tools to control, distribute, and make money from their content online”. Do you think YouTube is at fault, or is Viacom just spoiling for a fight?

In its heyday, the Comdex trade show brought in over 200,000 visitors and 2,300 exhibitors. It was the biggest baddest tech show in Vegas. In 2003, with the tech bust having run its course, the IT focused Comdex faltered and was shut down. Now UBM, which acquired the Comdex name in 2006, have announced plans to relaunch the fabled event as a virtual trade show.

UBM believes they can provide value in the show by learning from the original Comdex’s mistakes. “The original Comdex died because it stopped serving its core customers. We are giving Comdex a future by going back to its past," said UBM CEO David Levin. The show will continue to be focused on IT, software vendors, and business solutions.

The event itself will be packaged up like a live event with keynote speakers, an exhibition hall, and even a media room for journalists and analysts. These will all be accessible on the Comdex website. You can already see the promo flash animation complete with extremely awkward video rundown. Though details are scarce right now, we expect a mix of streaming content and virtual environments. Do you think this can work, or should the memory of Comdex not be tainted?

Comedy Central’s parent company Viacom is apparently moving ahead with plans to remove popular shows like The Daily Show and the Colbert Report from Hulu. Neither side is crying foul, but this represents a major loss to Hulu. The Daily Show is listed as the third most watched show on the service.

Hulu and Viacom originally reached an agreement in 2008 that landed the programs on the streaming service. According to Hulu’s Andy Forssell in a blog post, “In the past 21 months, we’ve had very strong results for both Hulu and Comedy Central, in terms of the views and revenue we’ve generated.” It seems that Viacom simply wanted better terms to extend the streaming license, and Hulu wasn’t having it.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t stream The Daily Show or Colbert Report, but you’ll have to go to their respective websites. This is the sort of fracturing of the online video model that consumers don’t need. Many people expecting to see this content on Hulu might not know seek it out elsewhere. Those are eyeballs Viacom won’t get back. Hulu said users that have subscribed to the affected shows will be notified of their removal today. Maybe if that pay wall ever goes up, Hulu could spread around more cash to prevent defections.

In a recent presentation to music and tech industry executives, NPD Group’s Russ Crupnick had some interesting things to say about music streaming. According to Crupnick, on-demand streaming services like Spotify result in a 13 percent decrease in paid downloads. He went on point out that services that follow the “radio” model, like Pandora, increase sales 41%.

Pandora doesn’t allow users to select specific songs like Spotify, but instead plays music in a chosen genre more or less randomly. The unsurprising conclusion is that people are less likely to buy a song if they can stream it at any time. Perhaps it isn’t that simple; is it possible to draw enough new users to increase overall sales? The key for Spotify may be the effort to convert free users to paid premium users.

This report is just the sort of thing music labels could use to justify keeping Spotify from launching in the US. Warner Music Group Chairman Edgar Bronfman said earlier this month, “Free streaming services are clearly not net positive for the industry.” If Spotify launched stateside, would you ante up for extra features like mobile streaming?

The news broke today that troubled movie streaming service Vudu is being acquired by Wal-Mart for a rumored $100 million. Amid interest from Comcast, Amazon, and Best Buy it seems that America’s largest retailer just had the deepest pockets and the apatite to get into the streaming game. The deal is likely to be finalized in a matter of weeks.

Wal-Mart is the largest seller of DVDs, but has never had a platform for delivery of video over the internet. With the purchase of Vudu, they have a mature service with many content deals already in place. The interesting thing about Vudu is that they stopped making a stand-alone hardware box last year, instead focusing on getting their software embedded in various devices like TVs and Blu-Ray players. Guess who sells a lot of TVs. Yep, Wal-Mart.

It would be reasonable to expect Wal-Mart to aggressively push Vudu enabled TV’s and other devices now that they own it. We may also see manufacturers become more receptive to adding the Vudu service to their products now that a behemoth like Wal-mart is involved. Wal-mart effectively drives down prices wherever they go, could that also hold true in the video streaming space? Could we be looking at a cheap streaming future? Let us know what you think in the comments.

There's no running from Netflix, which has partnered with almost every hardware manufacturer possible. Now the streaming video service is even available on Sony's Dash.

The addition of a dedicated app for Netflix helps the Dash live up to its description as a personal Internet viewer, giving owners instant access to a growing catalog of thousands of movies and TV episodes.

"We're continuing to develop innovative products that bring online music, news, video, and more into our customers' homes in real time," said Brennan Mullin, senior vice president of Sony Electronics' personal imaging and audio business. "By addressing content from Netflix and Demand Media to our Dash product, Sony is giving consumers a new, convenient way to enjoy some of the highest quality entertainment and most useful information on the Internet today."

Content streamed from Netfix will be thrown in a "queue-based user interface" that will be automatically displayed when Dash owners touch the Netflix icon.